Thursday, September 15, 2011

FULL
TEXT: Kansas City, Kan., is the first city to take drastic and unusual steps to
curb the nationwide spread of wife-beating, and the procedure it has taken is
sensational in the extreme. Police Judge Joseph H. Brady has reproduced in
spirit the old public pillory only slightly modified from the models used by
our Puritanic ancestors.

The
ancient English custom of punishing offenders by fastening them in conspicuous
chains upon some traveled thoroughfare or popular square, previous to Its
re-creation by Judge Brady, had not been seen in America since 1837, the year
when the last one was discarded on the grounds that it was too barbarous for
civilized people to behold.

The
pillory and stocks were employed very little after 1817, when they were finally
decreed to be unfit for the imprisonment of women. [This 1817 date may be a
reference to the infamous Margaret Pool case, the first ransom child kidnapping
in America, which ocurred in Baltimore, involving a woman who abducted and tortured a toddler and kept the
child while awaiting an offer of reward for returning her. The punishment of
Nancy Gamble, the kidnapper and her female accomplice, which included putting
them in stocks was hotly debated in the press as overly harsh – by males.]

~ Revived for Wife-Beaters. ~

This
revival of an old principle of punishment is not to be used in chastising any
offenders except wife beaters. In fact Judge Brady decided to revive it only
when wife-beating became so prevalent as to assume almost the proportions of an
epidemic. The Puritans and other organizations of a like severity of opinions
threw not only wife-beaters, but all kinds of petty criminals into the pillory
and stocks,

Daniel
Defoe, the celebrated author, was put upon a platform in London once with his
head and hands fastened in the yoke, because of debt. The system was very
fashionable throughout the England and America of colonial days. It had been
used extensively to the British Isles for centuries previous to the time of
George III, and had been instituted Into the country by the Normans in the time
of William the Conqueror.

Every
town and city had in its public square a tall unroofed platform with the
pillory and stocks upon it. In some instances the heart and hands were clamped
fast, in others only the legs, but in either event the public was permitted to
cast nil manner of refuse and even stones at the imprisoned wretch.

~ Mob Often Stoned Them. ~

Often
the mob would become so excited with the sport of bombarding a helpless person
that they would work severe injury and occasion death upon the prisoner.

The
new pillory in Kansas City is not so pretentious, although its principle is
exactly the same. It consists of a two-inch gas pipe, six feet in height set in
a seventy-five-pound hitching weight. About a foot from the base is an iron
ring to which a six foot chain and ankle irons are attached.

It
has been set up in Huron Park, near the foot of a tail flag pole and directly
beside a traffic officer, who is stationed to this, the busiest corner of the
town. Thousands of people pass this spot daily.

Judge
Brady says: “I want these passers-by and those who will congregate there to
draw their own conclusions of a man who will strike awoman.

“For
more than twelve years I have been connected with local courts, and have had my
ears shocked with tales of brutality by husbands who think a wife should be
kept in a state of terrorized subjection. I am going to stop it now.

“Maudlin
sentiment about excessive punishment is the cause for much of this kind of
crime. It has been the habit of certain brands of reformers to work, for the
liberation of men justly sent to prison with the result that they are
encouraged to repeat their offense.

“For
my part I ask no greater pleasure than to add a drop of bitterness to the cup
of any brute who would assault his wife.

“I
have listened to the bragging statements of men coming out of workhouses where
they have taken nothing more strenuous, than a rest cure. They boast that the
only way to rule a home is through fear. I amtired of hearing this. I have come to the conclusion
that the chronic wife-beater and myself never will understand each other. My
lectures on the duties of a husband fall on deaf ears. Their contentions that I
am sophisticated in the ways of women are obnoxious to my views of human
conduct. When I send them to the workhouse a bunch of sentimental women and
foolish men go to their rescue, sympathize with the prisoner and finally
procure his release on parole. Soon he is back in court again for the same
offense.

“The
whipping post isnow out of date except in London and Delaware, where it
is being operated with success.”

Despite
considerable criticism of the method many clubwomen in Kansas City have
declared themselves heartily in favor of Judge Brady’s plan.

~ Increase of Wife-Beating. ~

From
all quarters comes the report of ho increase in wife-beating. Chief of Police
H. W. Hammill of Kansas City, Mo., while, doubting the propriety of a public
pillory, admitted that physical chastisement vented by husbands upon wives had
become so common that something decisive was needful in the way of correction.

That
wife-beating in some sections of the country is increasing is stated by Judge
John Newcomer of the Municipal Court of Chicago, who as an authority upon the
psychology and theories of correction of wife-beating is as well known ns for
his services in domestic relations courts.

“While
I doubt whether wife-beating is on the increase,” said Judge Newcomer, “taking
the country as a whole, it is certainly true that it is more prevalent in some
particular parts. Certain classes of foreign-born inhabitants are crone to
wife-beating, due more to their lack of education than to their essential
brutality.

~ Largely Due to Ignorance. ~

“It
is with these people largely a matter of ignorance. They have been taught that
their wives are their property and that they have every right to bestow
lickings upon them whenever it becomes advisable they have been brought up in
the wrong atmosphere, and the habit of whipping and cuffing their spouses
become, habitual a mere reminder marital responsibility.

Liquor
has been blamed for a great part of the wife-beating, but I have found in cases
before me little but a contributing cause and not the main incentive. The reason
that wife-beaters are so often under the. influent of alcohol at the time of
the beating is notin
itselfproof that strong drink is
responsible

Even
a small amount of liquor intensifies the emotions and feelings, and in that
condition an upbraiding wife will provoke the assault which has been the back
of her husband’s brain in the form of a half-formulated determination.

“There
is no doubt that there is another psychological side to wife-beating which in
the more idle and sensation-hungry classes is occasionally seen. But this is
nothing more nor less than a survival of the caveman ethics of courtship and
mastery and the endurance of it by women of this class is a subject of inquiry
into abnormal psychology.

~ Only Expression of Authority. ~

“The common run of wife-beaters perform
this act of cruelty as little more than an expression of authority. He is quite
to be surprised and astounded upon arrested and brought up before a judge for
punishment. However, he usually repeats the offense several times.

“I am
a very strong advocate of sending a man who licks his wife to hard labor in
some stone quarry and of paying the wife something during the absence of her
husband.

“If
the state or city were to pay her a certain sum during the incarceration of her
husband, we would not see so many wives begging for the return of their
husbands. As the situation now stands many wives are tend destitute when their
bread-winners are thrown into the bridewell and they prefer to be beating to
starving.

“A
wife-beater should be made to worse hard and earn money for the support of his
family during his sentence.

~ Fickleness of Women to Blame. ~

“I
very much doubt if the pillory and stocks would not brutalize the spectators
more than the prisoner. The public whipping and hangings were practically
discontinued in America, not so much because of any barbarism toward the
prisoner as because the sight of the punishment brutalized the spectators and
officials in the case.

‘The fickleness of some women has encouraged the act of
wife-beating. Their prerogative of changing their minds has confused the issue
in many cases and made life miserable for the justices.

“It
is a very common thing for a woman to prosecute her brutal husband and in the
hatred engendered by pain and humiliation insist that the judge give him the
maximum penalty, only to return two or three days after the sentence has been
proclaimed, begging and sobbing for her husband’s freedom. She dogs the
foot-steps of the judge everywhere.” Her pleas din into his ears every day.

“Native-born
American women, with the exception of that limited class which are reared in
idleness and luxury, permits the licking, do not accept the premise that a
husband has a right to do as he please with his wife. The trouble is not so much
with Americans of the old stock as with Americans who have been born in some
particular parts of Europe.

“In
very many cases foreign-born wives have lived with their husbands for years,
mutely receiving regular beatings, never uttering n word of protest until they
suddenly discovered that such barbarism was not lawful or proper.”

[J. Keeley, “A Public Square Pillory for Criminals in 1916 –
How Kansas Has Revived This Ancient Punishment to Curb the Epidemic of
Wife-Beating and How the Figure Shed a New Light on the Strange Psychology of
Woman-Thrashing All Over the World,” The Salt Lake Tribune (Ut.), magazine
section, p. 2]

***

►• You
have been told that before the rise of feminism in the 1960s that domestic
violence against women was tolerated by society as acceptable behavior and was
not taken seriously by police and the courts.

You have been lied to. The people who told you these
lies were paid to tell them you. In most cases you paid your own money (taxes
and tuition fees) to be lied to.

Here is one of countless pieces of evidence that demonstrate
the truth.

►•►• To see more eloquent, vivid
evidence proving the lie and giving you the truth, see:

No,
the claim that laws created by males were for the benefit of males is
false. Yes, the "Rule of Thumb" myth has been proven to be a
marxist-feminist hoax, taking an ancient English common historical
notation published in the 18th century and extrapolating it into
unsupported claims that 18th and 20th century United
States communities, courts and legislatures (laws on the books) were in agreement
with the18th century historical notation (Blackstone).

***

“[O]nly since the 1970s has the criminal justice system
begun to treat domestic violence as a serious crime, not as a private family
matter.”